


These Precious Moments

by fjalamoth



Category: Fate/Zero
Genre: Background Irisviel/Kiritsugu, Bittersweet, F/F, Set before Irisviel returns Avalon to Kiritsugu
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-19
Updated: 2014-12-19
Packaged: 2018-03-02 06:00:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2802128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fjalamoth/pseuds/fjalamoth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>You may have forgotten, but I'm not a normal human</i><br/> <br/>Saber and Irisviel, before the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	These Precious Moments

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gogollescent](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gogollescent/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide! I was really happy to match on your prompt, I hope I did it justice.

It's quiet in the tiny shed, and the air is heavy. Maiya left some ten minutes ago to make preparations for their upcoming negotiations with Tohsaka Tokiomi, and Irisviel hasn't moved at all since then. She's still resting in her magic circle, unmoving and unspeaking as if she were asleep - or, given that her eyes are open - dead. Soon this will all come to an end. Soon she really might be dead. Saber dares not disturb her rest, she'll have precious little of that in the near future.

"Saber." Irisviel breaks the silence, and the glassy stare evaporates in favor of her normal, steady gaze fixed on the woman standing guard over her.

"Yes?"

"Come lie here with me?" Even though she says it like a question it's unquestionably a command. A command like that from a princess to her knight. Like a command from a Master to her Servant. But Irisviel is not a princess, and she and Saber do not even share a formal bond as Master and Servant

Sometimes Saber hates Kiritsugu completely. What a cruel twist of fate to have him as her Master when there's a far more suitable person right here beside her. She still can't shake the image of Diarmuid's eyes as he rightfully curses them all with his last breath. After today she has no doubts that Kiritsugu's way of doing things is beastly. Then again Saber did let Irisviel sweet talk her right into being an accomplice of sorts. Can someone who loves a monster like him really be left untouched by it? The woman who is still waiting for her answer, her acceptance, must have read something in Saber's expression because she quickly looks away. Saber finds that she can't bear to see her face bathed in sadness. What she wants is for Irisviel to always smile, and it hurts more than she's willing to admit to even slightly doubt that smile. Irisviel is a good person. She forces down her hurt, her confusion, and moves to sit down at Irisviel's side.

"Are you feeling better?"

"Just having you close to me makes me strong," Irisviel whispers, looking at her from under her lashes.

"Irisviel!"

"You're my valiant knight, it's only natural." She smiles mischievously, as if it's some kind of private joke that Saber's not in on.

Saber was married, once. It was a marriage borne out of practicality and politics, and no one who knew her true gender ever expected her to care for Guinevere in a less than platonic fashion. She held no such expectations or emotions herself either. It didn't bother her; first and foremost Arturia was a king, and a king has no freedom in such matters. This was just one more thing that she couldn't have, this connection. Yet when Irisviel gazes at her or calls her her knight, it's as if the air grows thinner and she has to remember to breathe. It's different— levity disguising something that feels unexpectedly important.

Irisviel's breathing is labored, but she doesn't look like she's in pain, she's smiling. "I've temporarily reconnected my sense of touch." She trails one pale finger across Saber's brow. "This could be the last time I can touch a person, as a person. It feels like it should be significant somehow."

The temperature in the shed is comfortable enough but Saber finds herself shuddering under Irisviel's frank gaze.

"Kiritsugu has such gentle hands, but lately he's been afraid to touch me."

They've fallen into such an easy camaraderie, and at some point Saber has started to think of Irisviel as _hers_. She's used to being surrounded by subjects, not equals (and certainly not Masters). The mention of that hated man snaps her out of it. Irisviel was never hers. She shouldn't have forgotten that, and yet somehow she did. Just as she belongs to England, Irisviel has her own duty, freely chosen.

"You'll touch me, won't you, Saber?"

Irisviel's arms wrap around Saber and suddenly she can't move. It's not because the other woman's grip is so strong - it's not, rather it's alarming feeble - she can't move because it feels like her brain's shorting out. In all her years as a king no one ever touched her like this. This intimacy, the shallow breath on her neck that makes her skin tingle and her stomach fill with butterflies, the smell of some kind of lotion on her arms, the heartbeat that she can make out beneath the frail ribcage… it's too much. Then Irisviel kisses her, and her mobility returns. Irisviel kisses her carefully, with experience, while Saber's response simply is to mash their mouths together blindly.

Her first thought is that Irisviel's lips are dry, so she tries to flicker her tongue against them to wet them. She ends up licking Irisviel's nose instead, and she can feel the other woman shaking against her. "That tickles, Saber," Irisviel manages to get out when coming up for air. Saber feels her cheeks heat, she didn't want to betray her inexperience so soon. The look in Irisviel's eyes is far from mocking though; it's honestly embarrassing, the way she gazes at Saber as if she were something desirable.

As they kiss again, Saber's right hand moves as of its own, landing on Irisviel's left breast. The thin red silk does nothing to hide the softness of the body underneath and Saber draws in a sharp breath of excitement. By now there's a dull throbbing between her legs that won't let up, so she hooks one of her legs around the other woman's and desperately tries to achieve some friction through the thick fabric of her suit. Unbidden memories of Irisviel's delight in putting Saber in said suit surfaces— what was it she said about wanting Saber to match with her? Suddenly Saber is very aware of how intimate this is, their bodies only separated by flimsy clothing, the heat of the other woman bleeding into her. Even though she's still frighteningly weak Irisviel seems to gain strength from the contact, and starts moving against her with a determined rhythm.

"I'm changing, Saber. Soon I won't want you anymore."

Saber halts at the unexpectedly bitter words, but Irisviel just grabs her tighter. Saber's back hits the floor with a thud as the other woman with surprising strength rolls her over and straddles her. The scent of chalk and dust is in the air, and the ground exudes a certain chill.

"I won't want anyone, or anything, I'll be something else entirely. Saber, I'm scared." Spilling out these treacherous words, Irisviel snakes a hand into the waist band of Saber's suit pants. When she starts rubbing between her legs, Saber quickly loses every semblance of coherence.

"Irisviel!"

Irisviel continues the frantic movement of her hand, her long hair falling like a curtain across her face. She's beautiful like this, more alive than Saber has ever seen her, filled with some of the same enthusiasm as when she recklessly raced her car down the winding road in the dark. Despite her words Irisviel has never seemed more herself than at this very moment. Suddenly Saber needs to see her expression more clearly, so she raises a hand to part the curtain of hair. Irisviel takes it as a cue to bring her face down, to kiss her, and they tangle together, while heat coils in Saber's stomach. When she reaches the brink she's not expecting it, and she arches her back in a pleasure that rushes over her like a tidal wave. All the while Irisviel is close to her, panting, whispering her name. For a moment Saber just lies there, dazed, but she refuses to let this be one sided. Raising herself up into a sitting position, she wonders at how light Irisviel is, draped onto her, still unsatisfied, her normally pale face red.

"Irisviel," Saber says, once more confident and composed, "I will protect you. When the end comes, you won't be alone."

It's a spontaneous vow, and if there wasn't already heat in Saber's cheeks this alone would bring color to them. Irisviel just laughs softly, but it's a laughter without bitterness or shadow this time.

"I'll take you at your word, oh knight of mine," she teases, "but perhaps you'll save me from this predicament I've found myself in now, first?" She sounds happy, and Saber, flustered though she is, feels her chest tighten in a matching piercing happiness.

                                                                                       ***

Later on, they're lying together on the floor. It'll soon be evening, and Maiya will come looking for them. They need to get up, but at the moment neither is willing to forego this lazy comfort.

"What Kiritsugu is trying to achieve is right."

Irisviel is stroking Saber's hair, and Saber can't dismiss the improbable notion that their sexual congress has made her stronger somehow.

"That's why I want you to carry his will out to the very end. Saber, I know don't always see eye to eye with him. But you can't see what I see in him, you don't know his ideals like I do."

It should be weird, discussing her husband while they lie together like this, but it isn't. Saber has too much to feel guilty for already, and this doesn't even register in comparison most of it. She doesn't know the inner workings of Irisviel and Kiritsugu's relationship, but if Irisviel doesn't seem bothered then she's not going to be either.

"He's killing himself in order to save the world. " Irisviel continues running her fingers through Saber's hair, the points of her fingers clumsily bumping against her scalp.

"Reminds me of someone else I know," she adds after a short moment of silence. Saber doesn't answer. She's nothing like Kiritsugu.

The silence stretches on. What can Saber deny her, this fading woman, this artificially created homunculus (yet isn't she so very human in her arms?) who just like herself carries too heavy a fate. Their goals align; there's no reason to hold back.

From the moment they first met, this woman has had the power to draw out something in her. Saber knows what words people might use to describe her: cold, distant, arrogant, intimidating. Irisviel somehow cut right through all of that and befriended her on the spot.

Idly, Saber wonders if things would've been different if Guinevere had been more like Irisviel.

                                                                                       ***

The air outside is cold and crisp. Fuyuki is beautiful in the orange evening light, and one could almost forget that a war is happening. Almost. Irisviel is still resting inside, her condition stable enough for now but still worrisome. For a moment, when they were at their most intimate, she really almost did seem to be back to her old self. It's almost as if—

Something nags at the back Saber's memory, but as she tries to capture it, it evades her. She really shouldn't be lingering on the events of these past few hours anyway. There's a war going on, distractions can be fatal. Kiritsugu came by earlier but as is his usual way he barely afforded her a glance, let alone words, and he left soon after on yet another mysterious errand.

Saber hasn't forgotten her purpose. How could she, when the despair of her countrymen forever hangs like a millstone around her neck? She can never earn forgiveness until she rights that wrong. But if Saber can't even save this one woman she cares for, how will she ever be able to save England? This is why she needs to believe that Irisviel will be fine. Together they will reach the grail, and Irisviel…Irisviel will live happily ever after. With Kiritsugu of course, with the beautiful child they have together. Saber doesn't fit into that lovely vision. She doesn't belong in this time and part of the world, and it has no place for her. As long as Irisviel has a chance of happiness, Saber has to let go.

There are so many things she can't ask of Irisviel, so many moments that can never be. But isn't what she has already been given more than enough? The grail is closer in reach than ever. Irisviel is a warm-hearted presence at her side. As the sun slowly sets over the sleeping town, the woman she is coming to love and the country she will never abandon both shine brightly in Saber's heart. The coming night might bring catastrophe with it, but for just this one precious moment she will truly allow herself to hope.


End file.
